


Musings of Ruin

by notavodkashot



Series: Discretion and Restraint [5]
Category: Bleach
Genre: Character Study, Established Relationship, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-04
Updated: 2016-11-04
Packaged: 2018-08-28 23:07:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 971
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8466481
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/notavodkashot/pseuds/notavodkashot
Summary: Zaraki, Kenpachi of the Eleventh Division of the Gotei 13, glorified mass murderer and damn proud of it, is also a low key ikebana master.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [temporalDecay](https://archiveofourown.org/users/temporalDecay/gifts).



> For my tumblr prompt drive: How about something for Zaraki and Unohana? How do their dynamics work?

Zaraki, Kenpachi of the Eleventh Division of the Gotei 13, glorified mass murderer and damn proud of it, is also a low key ikebana master. 

When one stops to think about it - and overcomes the natural shock that comes with such a preposterous fact - it does make sense. He’s never studied it formally, much like he’s never studied anything formally in his life. 

But he has spent fifty years listening to Unohana Retsu talk about it every morning, while she brushes her hair. 

At first he listened only to her voice, rather than the words, fascinated by the way each pass of the brush and each sentence helped shuffle her back into the neat, contained lines of her current name, leaving behind the shadows of her old one. He will never not be fascinated by that shifting quality of hers, the ability to be wholly herself no matter what name bubbles under her skin. She’s like water, malleable and adaptable and indomitable, and he is the stone, crude and unchanging by his own power, only to be shaped by the strength of the current and the yawning of time. 

So at first, it was just her voice slowly folding into itself, losing its apparent edge as it wrapped itself in silk, but bit by bit, the words caught his attention. They were foreign words to him, names of flowers and lists of virtues. Angles and shapes and lines. Strange words that painted strange landscapes in his mind, but when he grew tired of the unknown, he began to ask. 

Small, quiet questions, at first, because he was not sure if talking would disrupt the ritual, ruin her careful dance into becoming herself. Zaraki is good at ruining things, has made a career of ruining others’ lives for them, in fact, but he is old and wise in his own way, enough to know some things need ruining, in order to be made better, but also that some things once ruined will never be themselves again. 

He’s not done with her, and he hopes, deep down, in the secret nooks and crannies of his soul where his arrogance can’t force him to lie, hopes but doesn’t know for certain, that she’s not done with him, either. She fascinates him, the quiet smiles and the sharp silences and all the twisted, cavernous truths in between. 

He does not want to ruin her, even if he knows, also deep down, also in the secret nooks and crannies of his soul, that he will, one day. 

But not yet. 

She was not ruined by his words, and even now he feels silly sometimes, thinking something as insignificant as a pebble could pretend to shift the course of a river that deep. No, she was not ruined. She answered, instead, voice glimmering as it slid end to end along the spectrum of herself, not quite settled in place yet. 

And the strange words ceased to be strange, and the strange landscapes ceased to be landscapes and became vases just as vast. 

He knows, these days, schools and techniques and history. He knows the weight of color and shape and how to balance it with the right branches at the right length, to make it something one would call beautiful. He can imagine, without much trouble, a fitting arrangement for a stray flower he sees, half bloodied after another worthless skirmish in the wastelands he’s been ordered to pacify. 

Yumichika knows nothing of schools or techniques or history. Yumichika likes color and scents, and insists on keeping a vase of fresh flowers in the office, the entire Division’s paperwork held hostage to his demands. Zaraki watches him preen about this or that bouquet, and makes it a game to fix it properly when he’s not looking. He never notices, but Zaraki wonders what would happen if he did. 

They are not stupid, despite how idiotic they can be, his third and fifth seat. They know where he spends his nights and who shares his bed. They think it’s a game, and they’re not wrong, but their grasp on the players and the stakes are completely wrong. Zaraki wonders if he’d tell them, if they asked, but it’s not just his story to share. It’s not just his skin that burns with a scar. 

He snorts a dry laugh, one day, thoughts fluttering all over the place, while she describes in detail her lieutenant’s latest piece - a true great work, at long last. 

“Is something funny?” She asks, as if Zaraki would forget the rules.  


Kotetsu Isane is not to be mocked, much less touched. Zaraki summarily put her in the same mental shelf as Yachiru, and called it a day, most of the time. 

“Just thinking how much you’ve ruined me,” he says, because it’s the truth and because his thoughts are his own, despite it all.  


“Is that a formal complaint?” Her voice is shimmery still, like shards of glass pretending to be rainbows only to shred curious hands.  


“Statement of fact,” he sighs, lying back to catch the reflection of her scar in the mirror and the ghost of his teeth around it. “Nothing more.”  


“You mustn’t speak in riddles, Zaraki-taicho,” she says, after a long pause, as the water settles and the last ripples fade, her smile kind and her eyes shrewd. “It’s hardly endearing on better men than you.”  


“Don’t see what’s the harm, then,” he snaps back, grin wide and fierce and taunting, and it’s in its own way like he’s facing her for the first time, sheer primal fear and a bottomless well of delight. “You detest better men than me.”  


Her mouth is frowning but her eyes are laughing, and he concedes that he is well and truly ruined, because this game is, for now, still better than a fight. 


End file.
